Italian composer and musician Mario Cottarelli has a chequered past in the music industry. Starting out as an autodidact drummer, he taught himself all kinds of instruments. Back in the seventies, he started to compose long and progressive pieces, but by the time it was of a sufficient high quality to offer it to record companies, he was too late, because the Italian progressive wave was over. Cottarelli then turned to dance and folk music instead in which he was quite successful. However, he never could forget his roots and in 2007 he reworked three of his older symphonic songs and released them on Prodigiosa Macchina, an album which now finally has reached us here at Background Magazine. And was it worth the wait? Well, yes and no. Yes, because the album has a definite seventies prog feel with a very nice section in the title track that will remind the listener of the increase of tempo which takes place in Genesis’ Supper’s Ready. No, because the voice of Mario Cottarelli is a big drawback. Not so much because he sings in his mother tongue - I can live with that - but his singing is rather flat. This makes that all tracks seem to last much longer than they really are and I don’t mean this in a positive way. I don’t think I will play this one very often. * André de Waal (edited by Peter Willemsen) Where to buy? |
